“CRM, project management, time tracking, billing” – these are all words and phrases associated with running a business. If you work in corporate America or own a business, I’m sure you’re familiar with all of them. Businesses use those and many more tools to increase productivity in the work place. Many businesses depend on these tools to keep their company afloat. For example, what would a company do without a free cloud-based business management software? How would they manage and build relationships with their customers? How would a sales team perform without the help of a sales software to help keep track of their leads? Imagine trying to manage multiple projects within different departments without some type of project management software. I’m sure by now you can see how important these tools are to a company. PayPanther is an all-in-one business management solution, providing CRM, project management, time tracking, invoicing, billing, and task management tools to companies, all packaged into one software. This prevents companies from having to go to multiple vendors for their business needs. It’s no secret that companies can really benefit from using a free cloud-based business management software (which is why so many companies use them), but what about individuals?

Could a free cloud-based business management software tap into the consumer market? It’s possible. Nevertheless, how would an individual benefit from using one? Individuals aren’t businesses…right?

Wrong! Individuals ARE businesses. Think about it. Whether it’s a company or corporation, the reason a business is a business is because it provides a product or service of value to the market. As individuals, do we not provide products and services of value to the market? Of course we do! If your mom were to ask you “What’s the name of that new Beyonce song?” and you told her the correct answer, you have just provided a service to your mother; a service full of value (and love I may add). The fact that the service was free is irrelevant. You still provided a service. If your dad asked you to pass him the remote, and you passed to him, guess what? You have just provided a valued service to your dad. Again, the fact that the service was free is irrelevant. You could have charged your dad for the service of passing him the remote, but you still wish to live in his house, so you didn’t (smart move). Therefore, as businesses, individuals could definitely use the help of a free cloud-based business management software to improve our lives. Here are some ways it could benefit the average person.

1. Easily manage your contacts

Every all-in-one business solution includes CRM (which stands for customer/contact relationship management) tools, which helps you organize your contacts into one simple place that can be accessed at any time. Unlike the contact management system in your smartphone, a CRM allows you to create notes about your contact, track how many times you’ve called that contact, create reminders to call that contact, and engage with the contact in many more ways. CRM software helps build relationships, which is why an individual could definitely benefit from using one. We all need to improve our relationship building skills. In the social network society that we live in, individuals are no longer familiar with the art of conversing with others. Building relationships with people in the real world is becoming increasingly difficult. Using a CRM could help counter this phenomenon.

2. Create task and reminders

No matter how good someone’s memory is, they always forget to do something. It happens to all of us. We wake up in the morning with goals we want to accomplish during the day, and we end up forgetting almost all of them by noon. In fact, sometimes we write down the goals we want to accomplish on a sticky note and end up losing the sticky note (they’re really easy to lose). Using an all-in-one business solution, an individual could create a tasks list of things they need to complete and set reminders, which remind the individual of the task they need to complete at the appropriate time the task needs to be completed. It’s almost like having a personal assistant to remind you of everything that you have planned throughout the day. Why rely on your “fantastic” memory when you have a software at your disposal that can remember things for you?

3. Manage your time more efficiently

Time management is one of the hardest things to master. Why? Because no one enjoys keeping track of time. It’s too hard. Think about it, we’re always around some form of time tracking device (watch, television, smart phone, microwave, oven, laptop, car radio, clock, etc.) and we still lose track of time. How helpful would it be if we had a time tracking software that not only keeps track of time (like a stopwatch), but allows us to allocate lost time to task we should have spent more time on? Or what if we needed to allocate a certain amount of time to a future task? Wouldn’t it be great to have that ability? That’s what an all-in-one business solution offers. Think about how many more goals you could accomplish throughout your average day if you always knew how much time you need to expend on each task you had to do.

4. Invoice clients who owe you money

Have you ever lent someone money? Isn’t it a nuisance? They promise to pay you back and as more and more time passes, everyone involved soon forgets about the situation. This doesn’t happen all the time, but when it does, it really stings. You could ask a person to sign a legally binding contract, but would you really want to sign a contract every time someone lent you some money? Of course not. That’s just not practical. What if the loan was only for five dollars? Loans between two people are usually based on verbal agreements. One party promises the other party to pay the loan back. Unfortunately, people sometimes innocently forget. An all-in-one business solution could combat this problem. Using the invoicing tool, an individual could send an email (that contains the loan agreement and invoice) to the other party involved. This way, even if the borrower forgets about the loan, they could always check their email for the loan agreement. In fact, if a certain amount of days pass and the borrower hasn’t repaid the loan, the software automatically sends the borrower a reminder email.

5. Manage your projects

When we think of the word “project”, we usually think of something that is time-consuming, complicated, and work-related. This isn’t always the case. A project can be anything. What If you bought the latest best seller and wanted to finish it in a week; that is considered a project. Without realizing it, you probably juggle multiple projects throughout the day. Projects are just like task, but bigger. Now, what if you wanted to finish the book within a week and gain five pounds within two weeks? That would mean you have two projects on your plate, on top of any other projects you may have already started. You would have to read a certain amount of pages of the book a day and create a weightlifting and eating schedule to follow. But how would you track your progress? An all-in-one business solution could be very beneficial in this situation. All-in-one business solutions come with project management tools; they allow individuals to start and record multiple projects, and track the progress of each project until completion. Projects can take long periods of time to complete, therefore, an individual may need project management tools to help them stay disciplined and on the correct course.